Merili
This is my second time reading this book, and it got even BETTER. (I listened to the audio so if I misspell the characters' names, blame that and not my poor memory haha)
- author does a great job giving FMC actual struggles, I literally almost TEARED UP on the train listening to when everyone is framing her for Papa Clements' murder, and the world just feels so set against her. and it HURTS. As a reader i'm 100000% invested. Few authors have actually made me feel this deeply invested in someone.
- Emeric is a great ML. He's just great. Very real, I appreciate that he's not considered this attractive dude at the start. Author does good job making the reader discount him with his awkwardness. No insta love
- Magic system is cool
- Bad guys are just bad, love it.
- Again, just so shook at how satisfyingly emotional this book actually is.
- I am 71% sure this is a weird retelling of the Goose girl? It probably should've been obvious, but I didn't realize it until the second time around. so kudos for an INCREDIBLY original fairy tale retelling, I am a Fan. This is top 10 books of all time currently.
- No spice but lots of innuendo. not for the young'uns
there are some scenes from books that i think about often. the scene where El kills the mawmouth is one of these scenes. i love this book, El is one of my favorite genres of main characters ever. same vibes as Nora Stephens from Book Lovers. Will probably reread this book again before the year is over.
I'm not trying to be offensive or anything about this book, but I'll just be honest with my thoughts. I couldn't figure out why the prince was so attractive to the MC. He didn't really have a personality or act like any real man I've ever met. Like he's just... it's like she's talking to a computer screen that bases its entire dialogue back to her off hallmark movies. There were a lot of cringey lines. And don't get me wrong, I'm all for the cliche cute romantic and yes, even cheesy lines, that get repeated a lot in romance novels. But the part where the prince was like “I can't wait to stroke your baby soft skin every night” (referring to their upcoming nupitals) waskaljs dflkasdflajlsd;fkl please no. Please no.
Anyways, again, this isn't intended to be rude. Just honest. I'm sure this book will be enjoyable to a lot of people. Just not me.
i started this some months ago but just couldn't get into it after how much i loved the agony of the first book. maybe i'll come back to this later.
This one is the BEST in the Elves of Lessa trilogy/series. They're all good, I just thought the romance in this was the cutest and funniest.
This is a negative reviewnot intended to hurt anyone's feelings
My curiosity got the better of me and I read the first half (~45ish chapters), then skipped to the last few chapters when it was getting too boring with the flashbacks. I'll be frank - I'm surprised this fic is so popular. It wasn't really my fave, and not because of the dark themes (although I did definitely skip the rape scenes bc that's a personal thing). but Draco wasn't that interesting.
For context, the first third of this book is “present day” after the Order/good guys have basically lost the war to Voldemort. Hermione is sent to Malfoy for the breeding program. Then, the second third of the book is one long flashback of what happened before they lost the war/things went bad because Hermione has suddenly regained her memories of those years. It turns out Draco was actually a “good guy” and helping the Order, he was a tortured conflicted spy, and her and Draco were in love.
Except when I read the flashbacks... Draco still kinda sucks as a person back then. Like he treats Hermione a tiny bit better than some of the Order members but he's still not nice? IDK I was expecting something different since it was supposed to be such a foil to his image in the present, when he Has To Be Bad and Hurt Hermione and Be Abusive because otherwise Voldemort will know something is up. But in the past, he was just as dark and mean? At the very beginning of the flashbacks, years prior, he agrees to be a spy for the Order in exchange for Hermione. Literally. Exact words.
When I read that I was?????? Why??? I didn't see this get explained. Did he want her in a possessive sexual way? Did he just...want a friend? Why Hermione? Why couldn't he just be a good person and be a spy for the Order in exchange for BEATING VOLDEMORT and saving the Wizarding World? It was so weird. Kinda ruined the chemistry and made Draco even more unlikeable.
Finally, the last third of the book is them doing plot stuff in the present to stop the death eaters and free Hermione etc. This was the part I skipped the most since I was pretty bored at this point, so if something incredibly redeeming for the story happened in this third, I missed it.
Overal.... yeah. Not a fave.
I thought we were over the era of having mean and unkind borderline abusive love interests be considered romantic, so far this isn't my favorite but since it's popular I'm giving it a chance... we'll see if it gets better.
I loved this story. KA Cobell switches between 4POVS, which usually I don't like, but she does a great job of keeping the different POVs flowing with each other and the characters' individual narration styles are different enough that I enjoyed it. I LOVED Eli First Kill and his sister, they were probably my favorites, and Mara was also such a fun character. I hated Brody which worked out because he was the KILLER >:o . KA Cobell also brings up the gravity of issues faced by Native Americans, which was especially eye opening to me because I am largely unfamiliar them. Overall a great read.
Dnf at 20%. It wasn't terrible I just felt like the characters were so flat and I couldn't get into it